Thirteen

  “You mean Claire?”

  “No, I like Claire. Who I don’t like is her new friend, Breezie.”

  “Breezie? That’s a cute name.” I tried it out in my head: Breezie Perry. “Why don’t you like Breezie?”

  “Because.”

  “Because why?”

  “She has a stench.”

  I giggled. “A stench?”

  “It follows her around. Wherever she goes, there it is.”

  “Ty, be nice. Anyway, like you’re really one to talk.” Just this morning, as we were getting ready for school, he’d called me over and asked me to smell the air near his bottom.

  “No way,” I’d said. “Did you stink?”

  “I don’t know if I stank!” he protested. “That’s why I need you to smell!”

  “I don’t mind my own stench,” he said now. “Just Breezie’s.”

  Well. This conversation wasn’t giving me the warm fuzzies I’d hoped for. And “Breezie,” come to think of it, was a terrible name for a girl with a stench problem. I officially crossed “Breezie” off my name list, since everyone had stenches once in a while.

  “So how’s Joseph doing?” I said, changing the subject. “Is he one of the Bad Scary Dry Cleaners?”

  “No,” Ty said. “Will you tear off a piece of black for me?”

  I tore off a strip and stuck it to his arm. He pulled it free and placed it where it belonged.

  “Another, please?”

  I tore. I became his duct tape helper person. “Why isn’t Joseph a Bad Scary Dry Cleaner? I thought you liked him.”

  “I do like him. He’s just absent all the time.”

  I got a bad feeling. “What do you mean? Is he in the hospital? He hasn’t dropped out of school, has he?”

  “I don’t know.” He held out his hand. “Duct tape, please.”

  “But…that’s awful!” I said. Chatting with Ty wasn’t cheering me up one bit. “Joseph shouldn’t be absent all the time. It’s nearly Christmas! And Bryce shouldn’t have broken up with Cinnamon! Christmas is supposed to be a happy time, not a time filled with sadness!”

  Ty regarded me quizzically. “Duct tape, please?”

  “Here,” I said, doing several quick rips. “The rest you’ll have to do yourself. I’ve got to go.”

  “Why?”

  I pushed myself up from the carpet. My hair swished against my back; that’s how long it had grown. The goal of cutting it for Locks of Love had floated around in my mind ever since June, popping up every so often and then submerging. But could-have-would-have-should have’s got you only so far.

  “There’s something I need to do,” I said.

  “You’re sure about this?” the stylist said, her scissors poised over my head. A chunk of my hair draped over the fingers of her other hand, the requisite ten inches dangling down. Once she cut it, I’d go from being a long-haired girl to a short-haired girl. No more ponytails. No more messy French twists.

  “I’m sure,” I said.

  The stylist looked at Mom for permission, as if Mom were the ultimate authority. It was irritating, because it was my hair. Sheesh.

  “It’s up to Winnie,” Mom said.

  “Yes,” I said. “I’m sure. I’ve been sure for six months.”

  “You’ve been growing your hair out for six months?” Mom said. “And this was why?” She looked surprised and proud.

  Warmth spread through me. Lars might be shocked—he might not even like it—but did I care?

  “Well, I think it’s wonderful what you’re doing, and it sure will make a difference in someone’s life,” the stylist said. She closed the blades of her scissors and claimed the first ten-inch chunk. “It’s hard to feel good about yourself when you don’t feel pretty. We all know it’s the inside that counts—but the outside matters, too, doesn’t it?”

  “So true,” Mom said, who’d been complaining more and more about feeling fat.

  “Will it be turned into a wig in time for Christmas?” I asked. My chest was tight with the scariness of seeing my hair go away, but I was breathing. I was okay.

  “I don’t know, hon,” the stylist said. She kept clipping. “But one day soon some lucky little girl is going to receive it, and it’s sure to be her best present ever.”

  January

  TY LOVED HIS CHRISTMAS LIZARD. Loved it, loved it, loved it. He named it Sneaky Bob Lizard, and he took it everywhere with him: to the dinner table, to the bathtub (Sneaky Bob didn’t get in, but he kept watch from the counter), to bed. It made me happy.

  On the morning of our first day back to school after break, Ty and Sneaky Bob joined me in my bathroom so we could chat as I got ready. Ty sat on the closed toilet; Sneaky Bob sat on Ty. Sneaky Bob’s yellow eyes watched my every move.

  “She is giving herself her beauty treatment,” Ty told Sneaky Bob as I stroked on a smidgen of the cool pink eye shadow Sandra had given me for Christmas. She’d given me a whole goodie bag of Sephora stuff, all different brands. I especially liked the “Bad Gal” mascara with its super-fat wand.

  “Now she’s making herself smell good,” he said as I spritzed the air with vanilla perfume and walked through it.

  “Something your owner should look into,” I told Sneaky Bob.

  “Okey-doke,” Ty said, hopping off the toilet. I aimed the perfume bottle at him, but he said he could do it himself.

  Ah, well, I thought. A hint of vanilla never hurt a boy. He spritzed a second time and whizzed Sneaky Bob through the mist. Or a lizard.

  “Hey, Winnie,” Ty said. “How many frogs would fit in lizard’s stomach?”

  “Hmm. A real lizard, or Sneaky Bob?”

  “Sneaky Bob is real,” Ty said.

  “Well, yeah. I was talking size, though. Sneaky Bob’s bigger than most lizards.”

  “How many frogs would fit in Sneaky Bob’s stomach. That’s what I need to know.”

  I imagined frogs the size of fists. I chunked them mentally into Sneaky Bob’s belly. “Three,” I said.

  “And how many bugs can one frog eat?”

  “Hmm. Fifteen?”

  “So what is fifteen plus fifteen plus fifteen?”

  “You figure it out.” He was smart. He just didn’t always know it.

  “Forty-five,” he said, pleased. “That means Sneaky Bob can eat forty-five bugs.” He patted Sneaky Bob’s head. “Good Sneaky Bob.”

  I put on the dangly blue and green earrings that were my present from Lars and swished my head to feel their weight. They were beautiful. At first I worried they’d look freakish with my short hair—I was accustomed to dangly earrings with long hair—but Cinnamon and Dinah had assured me that they actually looked better with my chin-length bob. More dramatic. More sophisticated.

  “What do you think?” I said, turning to Ty for his approval.

  “Pretty,” he said. He tilted his face, offering up his cheek. “Kiss?”

  I gave him a smooch—was there ever a sweeter brother than Ty?—and bestowed an additional smooch on Sneaky Bob.

  “Gotta go, dudes,” I told the two of them. “Don’t eat too many flies.”

  Cinnamon and Dinah had a theory: Lars was the perfect boyfriend when we were alone; it was only when Nose-Ring Girl was around that he forgot how to treat me right. I hated to admit it, but it was maybe kind of true.

  My goal on this first day back was to help Lars set a new pattern. New year, new pattern—it was fully within the realm of possibility.

  How exactly I was going to do this, I hadn’t figured out. Basically the plan was to get to him first, before Nose-Ring Girl appeared on the scene, and just exist as my cool, laidback self. I’d have on the earrings he gave me, which would remind him of our fabulous “just us” time over break, and I wouldn’t let myself get cowed if Nose-Ring Girl did show up. I’d take Lars’s hand. I’d be confident. If I felt like snuggling against him, well, then I would. Why not?

  Flanked by Cinnamon and Dinah, I went to see Lars before first period. This was ballsy of us, as it
meant hunting him down in the Boys’ School, which was the old-school name for the building on campus where the high school guys had homeroom. At eight-ten, they’d join the girls for their actual classes, but during homeroom, it was testosterone city.

  Cinnamon was nervous as we opened the heavy door and stepped into the first floor hall.

  “What if we see Bryce?” she said.

  “Then we’ll glare at him like the snake he is,” I said. Cinnamon had gone ahead and given Bryce the Abercrombie sweater—bad move—but it hadn’t softened his heart. Louise later told us that she’d seen Bryce wearing it at the mall, the day before New Year’s Eve. He’d been with Stephanie, Nose-Ring Girl’s crony. Hiss.

  “I don’t want to see him,” Cinnamon said. “I’m not ready.”

  “His locker’s at the other end of the hall from Lars’s,” I reminded her. I clutched her arm. “Look—there he is!”

  “Who? Bryce?” she said, hyperventilating.

  “Lars,” I said. “Doesn’t he look adorable?” He was wearing his new “Life Is Good” shirt, which I’d decided in the end was a better present for him than for Dinah and Cinnamon. I’d felt a teensy bit guilty, like I was selling out by putting him ahead of them, but that wasn’t it at all. He was hard to buy for, and a “Life Is Good” shirt was quirky and just the right amount of intimate without going overboard. Dinah and Cinnamon were easy to buy for. Plus, it wasn’t like they knew I’d switched their gift idea over to Lars. All they knew was that I’d given them lovely almond-scented shampoo and conditioner from The Body Shop. They were most appreciative.

  “Aww!” Dinah said. “That color looks awesome on him.”

  It did, it did. The shirt I’d selected was forest green, soft and faded, with a smiley stick figure guy on skis, since Lars loved to ski.

  My heart rate quickened. “Lars!” I said when we were within feet of him. “Hey!”

  He turned from his locker, and his face lit up. “Winnie! Nice earrings.”

  “Nice shirt,” I retorted. He pulled me close, circling his arm around my waist.

  He said “hey” to Cinnamon and Dinah, and he wasn’t weird toward Cinnamon, which was good. He didn’t mention Bryce. Neither did she. The four of us groaned about school being back in session and the prospect of getting our finals back, and the whole time, his arm stayed around me.

  And then it left. His arm. He pulled away from me, and my throat closed. Nose-Ring Girl was heading our way.

  “Doesn’t she know this is the Boys’ School?” Dinah whispered in my ear. “What is she doing here?”

  Apparently, the same thing we were: visiting Lars. She gave him a teasing smile, a stupid, tenth-grade, I’m so cool smile, and I tried to keep my expression impassive. But nervousness made my armpits suddenly damp.

  “Hey, mister,” she said to Lars. She said not one word to me or Cinnamon or Dinah. She didn’t even comment on my hair, although she had to have noticed. (Lars, for the record, had tousled my newly short hair two days after I got it cut and said I looked terrific. “But you’d look terrific no matter what,” he’d said.)

  “Hi, Brianna,” I said, just to prove I could. Yes, her name was Brianna. Now that was a bad name. A conceited, self-centered, boyfriend-stealing name. I’d continue to call her Nose-Ring Girl, thanks very much.

  “Hi,” she said with no eye contact. She bumped Lars’s hip. “Great party Friday, huh?”

  Party? What party? “I thought you went out with the guys on Friday,” I said.

  “Um, I did,” he said, looking uncomfortable.

  “Yeah, to Stephanie’s party,” Nose-Ring Girl said. “Her parents were out of town. We did Jell-O shooters.”

  “What’s a Jell-O shooter?” Dinah asked.

  Nose-Ring Girl glanced at her. She laughed.

  The warning bell rang, and Lars raked his hand through his hair. “You better go,” he said to me. “You’ve got to make it all the way over to the junior high building.”

  Nose-Ring Girl laughed again, with a snortish sound mixed in.

  I felt helpless. I wanted to give Lars a quick kiss, to claim him as mine, but there was just too much in the air.

  “Call me?” I said.

  “You bet,” he said.

  “Promise?”

  Nose-Ring Girl rolled her eyes.

  “I said I would,” Lars said.

  I felt like an idiot.

  “Come on, Winnie,” Dinah said. “Let’s go.”

  I had to fight not to look back over my shoulder.

  The next day I skipped lunch, heading instead to the collection of Dumpsters behind the cafeteria. No one was supposed to go back there. It was smelly and shadowy and littered with cigarette butts, which you never never never saw on the rest of Westminster’s campus. Where the Dumpsters lived was the dark underbelly of the school—and leaning against the back wall of the cafeteria, one foot propped on the bricks, was Amanda.

  I’d heard she’d started hanging out back here. I hadn’t believed it. Or maybe I had, because I’d wandered back here to find her, hadn’t I?

  “Um…hi,” I said.

  If Amanda was surprised, she didn’t show it. She was still doing the heavy-eyeliner thing, and she’d dyed her lovely Alice in Wonderland hair a flat, matte black. Her mode of being was to remain unimpressed at all times, a posture she pulled off admirably.

  “Hey,” she said, neither friendly nor unfriendly. She had an inked in drawing of a rose on her wrist, I noticed. The petals, like her hair, were black.

  Are you happy? I suddenly wanted to ask. But I didn’t. Even I wasn’t that idiotic.

  Her buddy, Aubrey, regarded me with the same impassive expression as Amanda. Aubrey had joined the Amanda-Gail-Malena crowd around the end of last semester, but now it seemed as if Amanda and Aubrey had split off and formed their own Goth duo.

  “Um, can I ask you a question?” I said.

  “I guess,” Amanda said.

  I wanted to ask her alone, without Aubrey watching me like a lizard. (Only not a nice lizard, like Sneaky Bob.) But apparently that wasn’t going to happen.

  “Did you go to Stephanie’s party on Saturday?”

  She nodded, slowly. “I was there.”

  “She told her mom she was spending the night with me,” Aubrey said. She sniggered. “Which was true. We just didn’t watch The Sound of Music like we said we did.”

  A twisty smile cracked Amanda’s expression, and I thought without meaning to of Mrs. Wilson and her cashmere sweater sets.

  Would I lie to Mom one day? Would there ever be a situation when I’d need to? Even if I did need to, I didn’t know that I’d be able to pull it off. My gut hurt just thinking about it.

  Then again, I sometimes lied to Mom about wearing my bike helmet. And my homework. And whose granola bar wrapper was crumpled plain as day on the floor by the sofa.

  Well. Not important stuff, though.

  “Um…was Lars there?” I asked. “At Stephanie’s party?”

  Amanda nodded again. “Brianna was hanging all over him, as usual. She’s so trashy.”

  My heart sank. I was also engulfed with shame, as if it were my fault, which was so wrong and false that I hated myself for it.

  “Did he…seem to like it?” I asked. “I mean, not like it, but, you know, encourage it. Encourage her.” My cheeks burned. “Not tell her ‘no’.”

  Aubrey was amused, which killed me. I hated Aubrey. Bad Aubrey. Stupid, lizard-eyed, above-it-all Aubrey, who had split ends and didn’t even know it.

  Amanda shot Aubrey a look, and for that split second I had the sense that the Amanda I once knew still existed, even if she was buried beneath hair dye and black eyeliner. Amanda’s look said stop it, and Aubrey did.

  “He didn’t tell her ‘no’,” Amanda told me. “But he didn’t reciprocate.”

  “Oh,” I said.

  “Guys are like that. They don’t know how to say no.” She hitched up one shoulder. “That doesn’t mean he isn’t into you.”

&
nbsp; “I know,” I said. But I also knew that being “into me” wasn’t enough. Which sucked, because now I could no longer pretend it was.

  “Winnie,” Ty said, poking my shoulder repeatedly. “Winnie!”

  “What, Ty?” I was slumped next to him on the couch, my eyes tracking Timmy Turner as he battled a squadron of what appeared to be roaches. Ty sat criss-cross-applesauce on top of a pile of throw pillows, Sneaky Bob in his lap. I knew he thought I was being a poop, but I was there beside him, wasn’t I? I’d told him I’d watch TV with him, and I, for one, was true to my word. Did he expect me to hold a conversation with him, too?

  “Want some Skittles?” he said.

  “What I want is for Lars to call me,” I said. “He promised he would, but he hasn’t. Why hasn’t he called?”

  “I have no idea.” He dangled his candy in front of me. “Skittles?”

  I focused on the neon green package. Sour Skittles—not my fave. I wasn’t hungry anyway.

  “No, thanks.”

  “Say ‘yes’,” he said.

  “Fine. Yes.”

  He jerked the Skittles away, holding them as far away from me as his arm would allow. “Ha ha, tricked you!”

  I regarded him with infinite hurt and betrayal, far more than the situation called for. I was fully aware I was doing it, and I felt fully justified, too. He had acted unkindly. Unkind behavior called for reprisal.

  Ty’s brown eyes went wide. “No, wait, you can have some. Hold out your hand.”

  “It’s too late,” I said.

  Ty’s lower lip quivered, which not everyone would have noticed. But I did, because I was the best at knowing when he was upset. Like if he saw a dead squirrel or something, I knew he’d worry about it and want me to say a prayer with him. “I hope you are happy in heaven,” he’d say, peeking at my face to make sure I was praying, too. “Amen.”

  “Just push that joke away,” he said. He reached over and pressed on my lower lip, which was jutted out in an exaggerated pout. “And push that face away!”